Royal Navy's future engineers are 'innovative, agile and skilled' says naval Commodore

Commodore JJ Bailey, deputy chief naval officer, recently paid a visit to HMS Sultan in Gosport – and gave a rousing speach to rally the young engineers.

Escorted by Captain Jo Deakin OBE, the commanding officer of HMS Sultan throughout, the Commodore inspected members of the guard of honour before he presented several medals.

In a subsequent speech where he addressed the naval base’s divisions, Commodore Bailey said: ‘As the commandant of the Defence College of Technical Training I am responsible for a wide range of engineering training, but somewhat closer to home, as your deputy chief naval engineer and a marine engineer, this feels very much like being amongst the home team.

‘You represent the future of our engineering profession and like me and many others before you, you are being trained to operate, maintain, diagnose and repair our Royal Navy, at reach, in adversity and possibly under fire.

‘As Royal Navy engineers and technicians we want you to be innovative, agile, skilled and professional – as professional engineers and technicians in the Royal Navy you have a unique set of skills and we will trust and enable you to engineer the future navy.’

At HMS Sultan, engineers and technicians are equipped with the skills to function as the ‘beating heart of operational capability’ – maintaining, repairing, sustaining and operating our aircraft, ships, submarines and vehicles daily on operations across the globe.